July 2016 Scrapbook Pages

Colonel Moore's Six Story Mill at the Mill St. Dam Site

Last Saturday we went to Greenfield to the Museum of our Industrial Heritage.

As many of you know, Paul and I love doing Genealogy.  It started back in the summer of 2003.  My main objective was to find out, on both my mother's and father's side, when the first ancestor came to America and from where.

We've gathered information, bits and pieces, over the years.  On my father's side we found that Captain John Wayte came from England in 1638 on the "Susan and Ellen."  He was 20 years old.  He settled in Malden, MA.  We actually found his gravestone in the Old Burying Ground in Malden, intact.  That was a big find!  Captain John died in1693 at the age of 75.

His son, Nathaniel Wayte, born in Malden and, we think, died in Malden.

His son, Phineas Wait, born in Malden, died in Groton, MA.

His son, Phineas Wait, Jr, born in Groton, MA, died in Groton, MA.

Then we come to William Wait and his brother David Wait, both born in Groton, MA but moved to Greenfield, MA.  They were recruited by Colonel Moore to work as coopers in his six story mill in Greenfield.

It was so interesting to see how the family came to be in the Greenfield area after settling in Malden upon first coming to this country.

But we could never find out exactly where that mill site was.  We knew it was somewhere on the Green River in Greenfield, but not exactly where.

A couple of weeks ago I stumbled onto a couple of sites on the Internet where it stated that the Mill St. Dam site in Greenfield was the site of this mill.  One of the sites was the website of the Museum of our Industrial Heritage.

It was so much fun to visit this museum.  They told us that the museum was definitely on the same site that this early mill was on, and this was the same dam that powered that early mill.

As an added point of interest, my grandparents are buried on the other side of this river, on top of the hill.

So, now another piece of the puzzle is in place!